Entertainment vs. Worship

More outstanding Stanley Hauerwas goodness from The Work Of The People. Travis and Steve just keep putting out fantastic material.

Comments

[Beth]

Thanks for the link. Hauerwas beautifully articulates here why I have found it hard to parse almost every evangelical gathering I've ever visited as "church." (I'd except, for one, a service at Jacob's Well in Kansas City.) Small, large, singing, sermon, discussion, multimedia, super-creative or super-uncreative, 6 folks in a living room, 500 in a gym, whatever -- the vision of what's going on has always seemed completely different from the idea that we have all arrived in order to to mount "the work of the people" together. I hasten to say they're often excellent Christian events of one kind or another, full of loving fellowship, growth, inspiration, good teaching, good sharing, etc. But everyone coming in order to do the public, corporate, physical, transformative, cosmically-revolutionary work of the people? This understanding of why Christians gather on the Lord's Day just seems to be totally foreign to the evangelical mindset as far as I can tell.

On another topic, a friend of mine from the parish Hauerwas attends (or did?) refers to him foundly as "Stanley 'That's Bullshit!' Hauerwas.")